I want Edward Teach panties, so I can have pirate booty

[foxtongue]

I took this video of Chris at the Rhizome gig last week. some of the music

The BodyWorlds Exhibit opens today at Scienceworld! (His website's been updated, it's nice now. Really).

I went with Alastair to see it when we were down in L.A. It's beautiful and liberating in a way that's difficult to describe. I wanted to cradle every body, kiss thier eyes and know thier names. I stared and I stared, I crept as close as they'll let you to try and memorize every exquisite detail. The exhibition is full of moments of deep, abiding, and very surprising glory, where you find yourself suddenly enraptured with unexpected appreciation for things you'd never think you might see. The volunteer application sheets they have on-line require that all applicants have "Solid comprehension of moral issues regarding death and the displaying of human bodies." I suspect I would fail the test, if there is one. I am brimming with admiration for what Von Hagen has done, I am delighted in respectful awe, but I doubt I have any idea what other people's moral issues might be. Mine are unperturbed, only upset that there are not more of these shows, that it is not at least mandatory for school-children at the age of nine or ten.

Censearchip: exploring search engine result differences returned by different countries' versions of the major search engines. (The Web and image search functions of four national versions of Google and Yahoo!: the United States, China, France, and Germany.)

Summer is over and I'm not sleeping well, though I should be alright. My Oliver-inspired Pirate day is getting posted around as it should be, {it's come around back to me from three different sources today}, and people are saying they'll come. (My man Crow: "I was almost an innocent man!"). Last night I was ship building. Stephen supplied all the construction materials, minus silly string and blue glitter, I made the body of the big one, then Michael came over and made me a mermaid and an anchor, and Ed helped make some brackets for the ropes. Cardboard boats with broomstick masts, it looks like the big one will fit three to five people and the little one will fit two or three. That way we'll have a main ship and an attacker. I plan on simply chucking them off the balcony instead of wrestling them down the stairs when Tuesday comes. Should be fun.

Bush 'Slush Fund' possibly courtesy of the Canadian softwood lumber industry. (hell.)

I brought Sam two baby frogs in a fishbowl and a green mint cupcake for his birthday Monday and we curled up in a chair together and talked. It's comforting to have him back in town, extra special to feel safe and warm while being given small stories from Burning Man. I'm glad he went. He said he didn't miss me because I was everywhere he looked there. Funny how the man keeps me sane, like he's a shadowy mirror of a relationship or a wish I made as a child on the dried out fluff of a dandelion.

Comments

[porphyre.livejournal.com]

Yeah, see things like "Critics contend that the exhibition is sensationalist and that the artistic, lifelike poses into which the plastinated cadavers have been fixed is degrading and disrespectful." I just don't get. How is that either one?

The only thing I can think of that would give me issue about where the corpses came from is if there was rumour of foul play, if the people hadn't died of natural causes.

[kindelingboy.livejournal.com]

Is it just me or does "I had to kill them to make them pretty" make sense?

You know, in a Saw kind of way.

[porphyre.livejournal.com]

There's an excellent short story about that here in my room somewhere. In a book, like as not. A man is asked some questions by the police, he remembers that neighbor, sure, but they weren't bodies when he was a boy, they weer rose bushes.

He wonders what his mother saw when he brought home a handful of flowers.

[donnaidh-sidhe.livejournal.com]

It's only degrading and disrespectful if the cadavers were obtained, as you said, through foul play, or against the last wishes of the deceased. Actually, if you pose the remains in obscene ways, that would probably fit the bill, as well.

Now I'm thinking ten will get you twenty that the "degrading and disrespectful" comment was inspired by the fetuses.

[porphyre.livejournal.com]

I think there's the same sort of line between sexual and obscene aas there is between porn and eroticism. I don't mind plastinate corpses kissing or locked together with cut-aways to show where everything goes. I think that's beautiful.

[skonen-blades.livejournal.com]

As far as I know, he has enough corpses to last him a hell of a long time. Everyone is eager to donate their bodies to him. I saw the show in London. I found the fetuses fascinating. It's a beautiful exhibit.

However, one of the exhibits I saw in London that gave me pause was a Harry Potter corpse. His instestines had been stretched out and hardened into a 'broom' and his skin had been flayed and was flying out behind him like a corpse. He was wearing giant round novelty eyeglasses for that student look.

I would be mortified (see what I did there?) if my body was turned into a novelty corpse instead of the scientific exhibit I was expecting. Not that it would be possible for me to feel anything one way or the other but you know what I'm saying. I'm totally down with the graphic nature of the show but I have a problem when they target a child audience by using actual cadavers to represent characters from children's books or when they try to add a little lighthearted comedy to what should be a sombre and dignified experience.

But I do believe it's lovely. I'm looking forward to seeing it. I haven't seen it in two years. I wonder what has changed.

[porphyre.livejournal.com]

I didn't see a Harry Potter corpse, there was nothing like that at all at the one I went to. I believe there's something like three or four shows traveling to globe, however, so it's easy to think we went to different exhibits. I think a Harry potter corpse bothers me too, it feels like pandering, whereas the mad man, one I saw that was made of all sorts of whirling dervish peices, was exquisite and captured me for almost a full twenty minutes because there was no question that it was art.

[skonen-blades.livejournal.com]

Yeah the Harry Potter was probably London specific. And his flayed skin was flying out behind him like a cape, not a corpse. Oops.
I also liked exhibit with the plastified veins standing by themselves. That was fascinating. And so many others. I'm looking forward to seeing it again.